Yella! Moving on from Egypt
Thursday, August 2nd, 2007
Photo: The many towers of the Mohammad Ali Mosque in Cairo
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Egypt was a quick stop for me – 2 weeks, but I covered a lot of ground. I went from South to North, from Dessert to Sea, and even fit in some mountainous climbing. I was able to see various hilltribes, Nubians and Bedouins. Even though it was only 2 weeks, I was able to get a feel for the culture there, test my limits a bit and extract many cultural learnings. There were a few things that really made Egypt distinct and different to me. Sure, there are the Pyramids – that certainly sets Egypt apart; however, I tend to notice and fixate on other things, small things, personal interactions, observations, but they are impactful to me.
It’s A Man’s World:
As I traveled throughout Egypt I abided by the Muslim custom of females covering their shoulders and knees. I didn’t go as far as covering my head, but I felt like I was at a middle ground with the custom and went out walking in the streets confidently. One of the first things that struck me is that there aren’t many women out at all. Sure, there were tons of men sitting at a coffee shop/café, in fact, there were only men – not a single woman sitting and relaxing having a coffee with girlfriends. This seemed to make me stand out even more (as if my Lilly white skin wasn’t enough). I can’t say that I ever got comfortable with this man-only world. Sure, I had fantasized about being the only women amongst good-looking men at times…but in Egypt this was a fantasy gone wrong! Even though you try very hard to not call attention to yourself, you can’t walk down the street of any Egyptian town (Cairo is the exception) without being hassled by the men. I talked to our guide, Mohammad, about it and it really comes down to their view of Western women in Muslim countries. Most, not all, Muslim men see Western women as sexually lose and uninhibited. It was as if I was wearing a Bud Light string bikini, stilettos, sucking a lollipop walking by a construction site in NYC…now do you get the picture? If you happened to be walking alone, then you had a target on you – you could expect to get rude sexual comments, people coming up to you trying to ‘help you’, and sometimes men blatantly came up and grabbed you by the arm or tried to grope you. Sometimes they’d make you feel like you had to pay them off to leave you alone. Because of this, I learned two things – don’t walk alone, but if you do - wear your hard-ass bitch attitude on every part of your body. You had to become Teflon. Strangely enough, you do get used to this environment, you don’t accept it, but you get used to it. After a while, I hardly noticed that I was the only woman at the café, or that I had 3 teenage boys following me trying to get my attention by saying rude things, or a guy came up to me and offered his services to personally show me around the city – I just kept walking, knowing in my head that I was strong, a very strong Western woman.
Gun Control:
This country was loaded…with ammunition. Egypt’s security presence was like nothing I had experienced before, and for good reason. It was probably the most dangerous country I had been to at this point in my travels. The Egyptian government put a lot of time, effort, money, and manpower into protecting tourists. Convoys were flanked by a few jeeps carrying about 6 men carrying automatic weapons, ready to jump out and deal with whatever threat there was. There were little ‘check-point’ huts everywhere – at the temples, in the middle of the desert, in cities – men sitting (sometimes sleeping) in the huts with their AK47 slung loosely around them, smoking a cigarette. There were plain clothes security too…or maybe they were just some guy with a gun for all I know. When you visited a temple or any historic/touristic site it was mandatory that you went through a metal detector and they would search your bags. There was a metal detector before you walked inside the Pyramid, one before you hiked up Mt. Sinai, one at the hotel we stayed at in Cairo and Sinai, one to get on the ferry, one to go to the nightclub on the beach, one to go in the public toilet…and the list goes on. This sounds very comforting…however practically every time our group went through the metal detector it would go off, but we were never stopped – they just told us to keep walking. Many times they would only search our tour leader’s bag, and let the rest of us walk through. I guess being a tourist meant that you weren’t a threat…not very comforting. My favorite gun experience came in Mt. Sinai. We were leaving by minibus from Sinai to Cairo, an 8 hour drive. There were no secure convoys that ‘policed’ this route, so we were on our own…at least I thought so. As we were all eating breakfast at our hotel I noticed this bulky guy in a nice brown suit and aviator sunglasses on…trying to looking like secret service. As he got up to go get coffee, I noticed that he was carrying some sort of automatic weapon on a waist belt in his pants! This was not a pistol…it was large. This may have been disturbing and confusing to see, but after 2 weeks in Egypt – it didn’t really phase me too much. As we boarded our mini bus I noticed that they guy in the suit was sitting in our bus…now I was intrigued. I asked our leader, Mohammad, who the CIA guy was and why he was in our private bus carrying an automatic weapon. Mohammad explained that he was my personal security. 
Since we didn’t have a convoy to travel with AND there were Americans traveling in the bus (me and one other woman) it was required that we have a security escort. My own personal bodyguard…it made me want to break into some Whitney Houston song! Apparently there were special security rules for Americans, Japanese, and Israelis…go figure controversy pays off sometimes. As we traveled the 8 hours to Cairo – my personal security guard tried to hit on me…(see above…It’s a Man’s World)…which of course didn’t surprise me, but at least I did end up in Cairo safely. I decided to play up the flirting and see if I could get a picture of him when I arrived at Cairo as I would probably never have another bodyguard again…only in Egypt!
My first exposure to the tombs of the Egyptian Kings was near Luxor at Valley of the Kings. Basically this was a secret location, hidden deep in a valley outside of Luxor where the various Kings were buried with all of their loot. Valleys always make me think about the 1980’s and the era of the Valley Girl. I think I even had a book on how to talk like a valley girl…however I don’t think I was too convincing in Peoria Illinois. Even though the Valley of Kings was like totally awesome, I didn’t see one mall there…totally disapointing…I am sooo sure! As we neared the royal valley, we were first greeted by the Colossi of Memnon – two huge statues that were moved to dry ground when the Nile started flooding. They were impressive and cut out of one piece of rock. We arrived at the tombs and this was my first time to really understand what I was about to see…underground tombs that had been preserved for thousands of years. There was a bitchin’ model of the tombs at the visitor center – it displayed a 3D image of the valley topography and underneath the topography it displayed the myriad of tunnels/tombs dug deep into the valley floor. We were to see 3 tombs that day for our entry fee. 
We learned that all of the tombs here had been raided years ago – yes, think Tomb Raider or Raiders of the Lost Arc. The only one that remained a secret was King Tut’s tomb – one of the smallest in the valley. The treasure in King Tut’s tomb has since been safely preserved and is on display at various museums. The Egyptian tombs were really the first concept of buried treasure. The Kings tried to keep the location of the tombs secret as they needed to ensure that their treasures would stay with them so they could have them in the afterlife. They couldn’t just show up to the afterlife with nothing…after all, they had to sleep somewhere and they didn’t have the ability to charge a new bed on a heavenly credit card! In order to protect their treasures they had a small, trusted group of people working on constructing the tombs – about 50 people over multiple years. These workers were treated well, as the King didn’t want any unhappy employees building his tomb…as they would be more likely to give up the location to the treasure.
Our guide described how the Kings would build their sarcofigices/tombs in the form of how hey wanted to be seen in the afterlife. If they were short, they might have made a very tall sarcofigice, if they had a big nose, maybe they made their sarcofigice nose small. As the guide was describing this – one of the men from our group, Archie, said, “Oh, it’s like plaster surgery.”…perfect…I loved the comment so much that I had to use it! I guess even thousands of years ago the grass was always greener…go figure. I had an image float across my mind about my potential sarcofigice – one that had big boobs and thick wavy hair. Unfortunately, you’ll have to go visit the Valley of Kings yourself though as no pictures were allowed inside – but you’ll have to take my word for it – the hyroglyphics were amazing…this means a lot coming from me as I don’t even like old temples normally! I’d rather gag myself with a spoon than visit ancient temples…but the tombs in this valley were like totally worth it!
However – the granddaddy tomb of them all was the Pyramids. Due to my delay in arriving in Egypt, I had to save my trip to the Pyramids until my last day in Egypt. Rosaline and I got up early and had organized a private (air conditioned…thank god) car, and tour guide for our precious trip to one of the Great Wonders. This was it….this was the reason I had wanted to come to Egypt. As we drove through Cairo – we passed over the Nile and through downtown. I was struck by how modern Cairo really was compared to the rest of Egypt. As we drove further the modern thriving city turned into more of a dirty, gritty, apartment filled neighborhood – and all of a sudden I saw it. I could barely make it out in the heavy haze that morning, but there it was – a triangle point sticking up behind these old, ratty buildings. It seemed so out of place, to be so close to the Cairo suburb –a building 4,500 years old…talk about juxtaposition. I used to think that Boston was really unique because it had all of these old buildings amidst the modern ones – however – that thought seemed silly now as I viewed the pyramids sitting 200 meters away from a modern day Egyptian neighborhood. 
Photo: Guide on Mt. Sinai trail...not an easy hike!
Photo: Man working on restoration of a temple
Photo: Egyptian Camel
Photo: Me, Rosaline, and Sherif at the Cairo airport
After nearly 11 months of travel, it finally happened – I finally reached the end of my rope. Thanks to Egypt Air and Royal ... 
Photo: Colorful tea set
Photo: Fishing boats in Essaouria
Photo: Goats climbing an Argan Tree
Photo: Man working in the dying vats in Fez